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Saturday, September 6, 2008
Lichtman on Charisma and More
The Washington Post had an article about Lichtman in late August (by the science writer, not a political guy), and then Lichtman did a chat session. Rather than list interminable urls here, I think I will suggest that you go to WashingtonPost.com and search for “Lichtman.”
In the Q. and A. the charisma issue came up. Here’s the passage:
Q: Professor Lichtman: How do you deal with the question of subjectivity for the two charisma keys? While I support Obama, I don’t find him particularly charismatic, though I can see where some would. McCain seems to me not charismatic at all, but surely others see him as an exciting “maverick” and “war hero” and so on.
Allan Lichtman: The charisma keys are the most subjective or the most judgmental of all 13 keys. No election has ever turned on the charisma keys and this one does not. The point, however, is that there are always individual voters and some voters groups that will find particular candidates charismatic or inspiring. To reach the threshold for charisma under the Keys system, however, the candidate must be broadly recognized as inspirational. Such candidates are very rare. In recent decades only John F. Kennedy and Ronald Reagan have reached the threshold.
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